Masks
by crazyconversations
Summary: Their masks slowly slid away from their faces as they found a new companionship in one other. Until they had to leave, each to their school, and the masks adjusted themselves back on the vile trivialities of the world. R&R! Snape/Petunia
1. Chapter 1: The Streets You're Walking On

Masks

by DrunkyWinky

_Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. How could I ever own something real?! Only JKR can._

Chapter 1: The Streets You're Walking On 

_The streets you're walking on  
A thousand houses long  
Well, that's where I belong  
And you belong to me._

The phone rang, its pointed and high-pinched twisted music filling the space of the once calm home. Again. Its sound maddened her. It had rang all day long and now, as she thought she would finally get some peace and well-deserved rest as the sun slowly lowered himself into sleep, it rang again. She glanced irritated at her sister, sitting across from her, as she shoved a forkful of pasta in her mouth. The redhead only glanced quickly at her, half-apologetically half-irritated herself, then rose from her seat sighing for the millionth time that day and muttering a quick apology to her parents as she ran to the receiver up the stairs. She knew who it was, as her ear lingered on her sister's steps, following them almost absent-mindedly; she knew who had been calling all day. She knew it when she heard her sister's shout for the millionth time since the beginning of their holydays, she knew it when the phone was thrown against its receiver, and her sister's infuriated heavy steps could be heard at the kitchen door.

"Bloody Potter." Lily swore under her breath, sitting back at her spot on the peaceful dinner table. She looked at her, her eyebrows raised in mock surprise, a grimace twisting her lips. "Don't swear, dear." She faintly heard her mother say from across the table, as her dad looked amused, almost curious and happy at his daughter. "Sorry" her sister muttered back "but I'm definitely going to curse him if he dares calling again. What a-" but her sentence was broken short by the phone's ringing. Again. And she shot up fuming to yell at her oh-so-fervent admirer across the telephone wire.

It would probably have been entertaining to try and understand how the said boy had ever got their phone number, or even more interesting, how he had known there _were_ telephones spread across the world. She could have waited patiently for her sister to come down, to ask her about him, talk to her like they used to, or, more probably, start up a fight again, as they had they been doing for nearly 5 years. But as the phone rang for the third time, she stood up, excusing herself hastily, and decided she would go for a walk. It wasn't too late yet, and the street was safe enough for a night-time peaceful walk around the neighbourhood.

Grabbing her thick winter coat, she got out into the dark, cold winter night, hugging herself against the falling snow on her blond locks. The front garden lamp drew a faint golden aura around her shivering body, partially hidden in the obscurity. The shadow moved on its spot, as if hesitating, taking in the weather and cold, looking at her surroundings. She drew a shaking hand towards the doorknob, nearing back towards warm and comfort. But a sharp ringing shot up in the darkness, from the closed windows of the house, followed by a scream of fury, and she pulled back her hand, shaking her head violently.

She started to drag her feet up the street, towards no real direction, trying to clear her thoughts as she moved lazily away from the warm, pointed noise emanating from her home. It was darker than it should, the sun had just set beyond the skyline, but it did not bother her, she was happy to be concealed under it. Everything was still, people seemed to have retreated into their homes, sinking warm against the rash winter ravaging the outside. Only the faint lights which had crossed the thick heat-keeping curtains illuminated the deserted road. When the apparent stillness convinced her that she was alone, a shadow moved a few feet away from her. She jolted from surprise and her first thought was to run away, back to her house and parents, it was a stupid idea to go out in the first place. But it moved again, against an old and flawed lamppost, and she thought she had blurrily distinguished a strand of raven long hair moving in the weary light. Her curiosity hesitatingly took over, and moved her feet towards the secret figure, slowly but surely, she got within a few feet from it, until she could make out its face in the dark.

The boy then moved out of the shadow where he had been hiding, sensing more than seeing her penetrating stare. He leaned against the streetlight, looking straight at the upper window of her house, as if he was trying to discern any form in there that might save his life, a gleam of hope carefully hidden behind his dark eyes. Hers studied him, recognizing him instantly but as she wanted to record any change, any aspect she would be able to criticize later.

"What are you doing here?" she blurted out finally, after long moments of silence. She tried to make eye contact with him, disdain clearly stretched over her face and look.

"Free country," he answered bluntly, not taking his eyes from the golden-lit window, "can stand wherever I want." His face looked at least as disdainful as hers, but he was taller and seemingly stronger through his bony figure. However, she decided to stand her ground, even though she did not really feel like starting a fight that night. Except with Potter. She could burn him alive whenever possible. He would learn not to deafen her, oh he would.

"I mean, why aren't you at school? It's Christmas holydays. 'Thought you didn't like to come back to see your family." She said, peeking at what she knew to be one of his sensible points. His eyes slid quickly towards her, burning her owns in the darkness.

"I always come back home on Christmas holydays." He said, keeping his cold and infuriatingly calm composure while his eyes slid back towards the familiar window.

"No you don't. Only when she does, or when you can be with her." She knew she might be pushing him a bit too much, but she could not help herself, there was something that was bothering her severely as she nodded her head towards her house, not taking her eyes off his face.

"You wouldn't know." He said simply, clearly hating that she had noticed it, and obviously ignoring the fact that she cared enough to have. She shifted her feet awkwardly as she understood the meaning of what she had said, she could not even tell why she had noticed it, why she ever cared to check whether he was home or not. She shifted her weight again, studying his face and look, the religious reverence with which he looked at her sister's window.

"She doesn't want to even see you, you know." She said after a moment, she had somehow, between two fights, got wind of her sister's argument with that smug boy in front of her a few months before. Sometimes a long neck and a good hearing is all you need to listen to _secret_ conversations. She knew it had bit him, by the way he moved his foot ever so slightly off the ground and settled it back, trying to keep irritation from showing on his forever calm face.

"Oh, you wouldn't know that either." He said, a smirk curving his thin lips, turning into an almost mischievous smile. He looked down at her for the first time, to see the effects of his words on her. "She won't talk to you, won't share her secrets with you. I know. She hasn't since she found out she was a witch, at first, then when you despised her and she found out about that letter you sent to Dumbledore, asking –"

But a bright flash of pink cut him off, slicing his cheek into fire in the cold night. He put his hand on the spot, crouched on the ground, nearly fell over in the snow. It had been sudden, but not unexpected, and it sure would leave a rather obvious red mark. He looked up at her and saw her fuming, her cheeks were flushed red, but not from cold, and her slapping hand hung blatantly at her side.

"Don't you dare." She said angrily. But her voice seemed somehow muffled, as if she was suppressing something else, maybe tears, and he knew he had hurt her, he had dared to utter the unnameable truth. The truth he knew she was aware of but would never admit it, the truth Lily was aware of and which had destroyed her. That truth that would be truth until they both admitted it was and then it would fade into an old fake nightmare that no longer, that had never, existed. The truth that they were no longer like sisters, but cold strangers living under the same roof. Her voice acknowledged and hated it, but he could do nothing about it. He would never.

He stood up wearily, leaning back against his lamppost, an almost defying look on his eyes facing her anger, reading through her expression as she stared into the sickening depth of his. They stood there for another long moments, not knowing whether to move, to turn their backs to each other, or just to stand there. He went back to his silent vigil, as if it tied him with invisible bonds. She turned her head back at her house, it wasn't that early anymore and the warmth of her room against the rash cold she was standing in seemed incredibly appealing, so she forced her ear to detect any sort of pointed, hateful sound ringing into it. It was still there, she noted, ringing, crying desperately for someone to plug it off the wall at once. Maybe Lily would grow tired of it and break it against a wall, sending the Potter voice into nothingness. But for now, she seemed to be rather enjoying his obstinate nature and let it ring, and so it would until her father would turn it off himself. And so she stayed, in the cold, with that strange yet familiar boy from the lower street.

He seemed to register her decision, letting his eyes slid for a short moment down at her face again, then turning them back towards the golden square on the dark house.

"How is she?" he said, after a long pause. His eyes stared determinately into the dark, not wanting to let any emotion apparent, although his voice sounded almost like a confession, an admission. She was surprised at first, the nagging feeling of this short and apparently meaningless sentence of his being an opening-up, the first she ever really witnessed, of his cold mask. But she shook it away, not wanting to believe that he trusted her enough for such thing, taking it like any other casual question about the weather.

"She's fine." She answered, not wanting to let too much understanding in her tone. "'said she's having a lot of fun here but seems like she'd rather be back to that school of yours, as always." He nodded, and she knew he too would rather be there. She would rather be there.

"What...What's she been doing?" he muttered with some apparent difficulty, it seemed to be the hardest task for him than to let his emotions, his care shown.

"Trying to get that _Potter_ boy off her back." She said disdainfully "He's been calling all the time, maddening freak." A snarl covered her lips, matching his. He noticed it, the same opinions he had of the character stretched upon her face. A small and trembling smile somehow made it through the thickness of his cold mask.

"A real dork, he is." He said, all his hatred for Potter thrown into his voice, almost matching hers. She was surprised to find they had something in common (even though not for the same reasons. She doubted he had such an animosity because of some never-ending ringing threatening to deafen her forever, or even for his freakiness), and most strangely, that they could discuss it without being embarrassed in their disdain of one another.

"Yes. A real one. Even worse than one, I'd say." She supported, making him smirk slightly and let his shoulders relax against the hard lamppost.

They stood there, in the cold darkness, until it was too dark for them to see each other and she had to go back to her warm room and him to his cold, violent house. She would come out of her house every night then, secretly wanting to meet him, not admitting it even to herself. They talked. Like normal people, they only talked, chatted away about nothing, provoking each other on their differences, discussing her sister's doings, sharing their hatred of Potter. Their masks slowly sliding away from their faces as they found a new companionship in one other, as the night darkened in and the cold sharpened against their bodies. Only to slid back into place as they parted, mutely, towards each of their houses. And they would meet again, the following night, on the same streetlight, under the same golden-lit window, to discuss some of the day's events, some of Potter's renewed stupidities, some of Lily, and fell into a comfortable silence, each submersed in their thoughts, uttering small insults to one another and sarcastic remarks. Until they had to leave, each to their school, and the masks adjusted themselves back on their noses, pinching them high and cold against the vile trivialities of the world.

_A/N: hope you like it...er...Yes, well, I am insane._

_Throughoutly inspired by CraigThompson's Blankets.Even though I just noticed it as I looked back at his drawings. They're awesome, by the way. _

_Song "Swallowed in the Sea" by Coldplay _

_Please R&R! xD_


	2. Chapter 2: You Cut Me Down to Size

Masks

by DrunkyWinky

_Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter._

Chapter 2: You Cut Me Down To Size

_You cut me down to size  
And opened up my eyes  
Made me realize  
What I could not see._

She felt a strange emptiness in her soul as she came back to the normal course of her life at school. An emptiness that she could not describe, or even dare to, that had taken siege of a piece of her, running deep under the thick powdery personality she put up in front of others, deeper than any mask she could use, deeper than what she could ever understand. An emptiness that, at some point between wonder and ignorance, had turned into an impossible loneliness.

She still hovered around with her friends, giggling, chatting, admiring their forever-changing school King, kept an strict order with her papers and dormitory, shyly avoided the imposing advances of Dursley, a strong-built boy of her class. She kept the same pose; the pose of what she thought should be of any girl of her age, of her rank, of any acceptable person. She was all-knowledgeable of anything happening within the school's walls, of any novelty, any new relationship or teacher changing, any star's scandal or sudden rising, any meaningless thing any school girl should care about. Nothing had changed, but all was different.

For once, she felt something else. Somehow, the world around her seemed to have changed without warning. They acted the same, looked the same, but weren't the same. She was suddenly aware of their flaws, of their falsity as they talked and walked and lived around her. She was suddenly aware of her own falsity, her own mask that she couldn't get rid of. However, she would never really acknowledge that awareness; she would push it into the very pit of her unconsciousness, turning it into apparently meaningless dreams of nights, slipping masks and comfort found under dark trees. Sometimes, on some rare moments of lucidity, she would wonder whether he felt the same. Whether he too had sensed that strange emptiness, that permanent loneliness that had taken her soul in hostage, whether he felt the world had changed, whether he remembered those winter nights. She could never imagine it, however. The mere thought of him ever caring about her seemed to burn her powdered skin like melting metal, hardening her mask, her disdain for his _people, _for_him_.

She could never imagine it, but he did. An unconscious part of him had felt that emptiness, that strange loneliness taking hold under his skilled mask of coldness, under his apparent evilness and mystery. Being the boy that he was, however, he had associated it to his missing of her sister, of the girl he whispered to love, of the most obvious beloved thing that was missing in his surroundings. He had dreamed like her of some winter nights, but the figure changed and switched, her hair blond, then fire-like red dancing around, and then a black-haired boy would come ruin it all and he would fall into nothingness, into darkness, and wake up for another 6th year day for months and months.

The phone rang.

"I'm going to Ghislaine's"

"Don't be back too late, darling."

"Right, right" she shouted back at her mother as she closed the door behind her. Summer. Finally. She breathed out in her porch, taking in the sweet air. The sun was setting; night was slowly crawling against its red and pink lights in the skyline, giving an almost blue-ish glow to the landscape around it, on the houses' walls and roofs. It all seemed so peaceful, so normal, not expecting anything more, just being there. The wake of a new life after school did not bother it, there was no _after_ for the sun, just the_now _and its golden glow.

She started to walk slowly up her street, dragging her feet in the ground, staring mindlessly into the sky, a vinyl under her arm. She slowly reached an old and battered streetlight she knew only too well, not far from her house, already hidden in the night. Had she expected to find him there? Had a part of her wanted him to be there? Wanted to go out at this exact time of the day just to see him? She did not know. She would never know. All she knew was that he was, hidden behind the lamppost, his skinny shadow drawn blurrily on the grey walkway.

"ABBA?" he asked suspiciously, raising his eyebrow at her as he looked disgusted at the vinyl under her arms.

"Yes." She responded, trying to keep from him a slight jerk of surprise when he approached her. So easily, so silently. "Why? Not a fan, are you?"

"It's rubbish" he answered, shrugging his shoulders. He settled himself on his usual spot on the streetlight, tilting his head upwards at the oh-so-well-known window of her house.

"Well, then. What _do_ you like?" She asked, raising her eyebrows defiantly herself, staring straight into his bottomless eyes.

"I don't listen to _muggle_ music." He spat, looking down at her, his mouth slightly twisting. She raised her eyebrows higher almost ironically, marking her disbelief. "But if I did" he continued, tiring his gaze away from hers again and settling it back on the window "ABBA wouldn't be my first choice. I'd listen to Pink Floyd, AC/DC or Led Zeppelin. That's real music." He said, not a shadow of a smirk in his face, but a slight shame seemed to crawl on his eyes as he admitted his liking of anything of her world. It might have felt like a betrayal to him, but she could almost see a transparent Halloween mask sliding off his cheek. She laughed mockingly but softly, not too loud just the right tone, her eyes sparkling.

"And you call _that_ music?! That's all noise!" She said to him, acting almost insulted at his remarks. He answered something in the same tone, and their discussion continued, endlessly and blissfully.

And so forth the evening passed, raffled their ears and hairs as they stood there talking to each other in the moonlight, like they had done so many times the winter before. They talked, about nothing and all, music and noise, silence and insults, lonesome and accompanied, Ghislaine's vinyl soon forgotten. Some hours later, she slipped her mask back on its rightful place and moved wordlessly towards her house, darkness taking over her tired and now sore body, expecting her soft bed and a good night sleep. No matter, Ghislaine would get her vinyl the next morning. She supposed he had stayed a few more minutes outside, letting his own mask crawl slowly up his shin and nose, throwing some last few glances at her sister's slightly distinguishable shadow at her window, then leaving, secretly, to his own house a few streets away from hers.

They had met every night that summer. It was not acknowledged, expected, admitted by any of them, wasn't planned or looked for. They went there, at the same hour, almost unconsciously, they would meet as if it was an unfortunate accident, their strongly built masks clashing against each other in insults and provocations. And then, they would fall gradually by their eyes, noses, lips, shins. They would talk or be quiet, just being around each other. The other's presence somehow comforted them in each of their loneliness, the loneliness they embraced and used as a shield in front of others, or simply refuted by melting themselves in other people, disappearing in the swarm. As the masks fell, this presence filled the blank space left by it, they were comforted, accepted, keeping only a slight confrontation as a life-boat between them, as a reminder of how they were to be after they parted later in the dark night.

At one point, as gradually and naturally as it had began, they weren't static anymore. They started to walk slowly around the neighbourhood, unconsciously moving to the darkest, less obvious places, as if they were trying to hide their real faces to each other, to the world. They walked and walked for hours at long, until, their eyes closed by fatigue, they turned their backs sharply to each other only to realise that they were back to their usual lamppost, under the golden-lit window.

As days passed by, they somehow came to sit by a nearby river, not too far away from his house. They just sat there, on the riverbank, and let their beings fly away from their physical bodies. From there, on the dirty floor of the small woods, they could see the flawed skyline from where the moon and the stars seemed to rise, facing east, where the setting sun could not touch them yet. Often, they would fall into a heavy silence, that filled their ears and thoughts, that seemed to talk to them, transporting unspoken words between the two lonesome figures. Sometimes, a small fox would run pass them, stop to get a look at their dark faces, and run agilely to his burrow, carrying a freshly hunted mouse in his foul mouth. Their masks would slip all the way to their necks, and would just hang there as if tied by invisible unbreakable tough strands.

When the clocked neared midnight, she would shift in her seat of earth. He would glance at her almost surprised by the sudden move, by the break of their unreal transmission. Then he would rise, hesitate, awkwardly offer his hand for her to stand up. Not a comment was made, not a word was uttered, and he would walk her back to her house as silently as they had left it, taking care to throw one last glance at the window upon his head, before turning on his heel towards his be-hated household, his false steadily fixed on his nose.

One night, things seemed to come out of their normal stillness, only to fall back into them as the summer continued past their heads. It was not sudden, or unexpected. Neither was it foreseen, anticipated. But it happened the same way they had started to meet each night, to walk around, to sit by the river. It happened as if it was just the natural course of things, as the nature works around the world, gradually, progressively, nothing obvious building its way, but a small feeling leading towards it, whatever it was, a small feeling that none would ever know it had been there.

He did not know and would never what had made him do it. Maybe, had he seen in her the face of her sister, of the unattainable treasure he would never get to? Maybe, through her light eyes and unclouded golden precise curls, he had seen the fierceness, the near wildness so obvious in Lily. When they argued, fired, stood their ground through winds and rains, in so different ways, for so different reasons, he could feel that fierceness emanating strongly from both of them, that fierceness that made them sisters, that fierceness that he knew she would only show to him, that she would use for something else than the utmost importance of the keeping of her though mask only in front of him. Maybe it had been that fierceness, so alike her sister's, that had made him do it? Or maybe, had it been her single presence, her _being_ there, her company that overtook his whole and drew him to it? He did not know, he could not process it, but he felt it. And so, he kissed her.

He felt her respond to it, under that dark tree by the riverbank, in the darkness of a still night. He supposed she was as clueless as him as to why she did, as to why _he_ did in the first place. It might have crossed her mind that he was just the closer she could ever get to that magic she so obviously lacked and so hungrily sought. But they put it behind themselves, let any sort of thought slip away from their minds, from any grip, and fly in the soft summer breeze, wiping their hairs around their strongly bonded faces, flying their masks away like kites, cleansing memories, leaving all that was the real them there, sitting on the floor by a riverbank.

The nights went by as such for the next few weeks, fallen on the perfect stillness they were. They would meet by the lamppost, as unconsciously as it ever had been, would walk towards the old river, as mindlessly as they ever had, and she would brush her fingers on his cheek, he would look straight at her, and they would kiss until it was too dark for them to feel, and they would leave, as silently and thoughtlessly as they had come, each to their houses.

It was not known that they had something between them. People by the streets had sometimes said to spot them together talking at some dark corner, but were cruelly dismissed by any realistic enough neighbour laughing at their faces for the unbelievable fact they were reporting. It was not plausible, even in the wildest of their dreams that ever such a _good_ girl who hanged around with their own_good_ sons and _good_ daughters, would ever even get near to that _freaky_ and _smug_ boy from _Spinner's End_, as they pronounced it spitting disgust from their tongues. By this course of thoughts, they would never admit it even to themselves. He despised her for being a mere _muggle_. She despised him from being such a freak. And at night, they would kiss under the trees.

She sometimes supposed her sister might have suspected it. She might have suspected there was a boy somewhere as she went out every night at the same hour she had not fixed, she had never planned. Maybe one night she had decided to lay her face on her window, probably to admire the beautiful sun set, and her stare had slid slowly to the ground until it burnt two lonesome figures talking together by a lamppost. Until it followed them up the street, turned a corner and showed up no more until much later at night. Maybe she had once thought she had seen a strand of his hair, thought she knew who that bony boy was, maybe she had even known it was her sister there talking to him. She might even had known it all, might have been aware of their most important secret, but she uttered no word. She might have planned to, once, or she might have respected her sister's heart and mind not to. Or maybe she had just been there, on that fateful night, the last one of that summer, when the traffic jam unlocked itself.

They had been kissing for some time on the riverbank on one of those summer nights, one before the last. It was all silence around them, only their quickened and broken breath shook the air upon the river, only their slow and absent movements disrupted its stillness, only their bare feet on its water scared its animals away. She was sitting on his lap, her arms tied firmly around his neck, her hands rushing through his greasy long raven hair. His were on her waist and back, moving gradually up and down, sweetness unknown of his fingers.

They slid upwards, touching her shoulder oh so lightly, brushing the thin cloth covering it to the side. She broke away from his lips, slowly, and looked into the deepest of his black eyes. Had she known what she saw in there she would have probably felt like she had unravelled the secret of all that is. But she did not and she never would. She felt, but could never describe it. Maybe she had let her mind get so far away from her that she could not even think properly, but the indistinguishable thing she saw in there, that feeling she could not describe but could not but resign in front of it. She could not but forget all that was, all that was to be, all that hid what she was and give in to that feeling, that one which shadow she saw in his eye, that one which had taken over her own pale eyes, that she felt running through her body, that one that she fell to define as_Magic_. And then, on that night between thousands, he took her.

It was like that first kiss, he had thought at first. Gradual, natural, mute. They had not talked; they had barely dared to make any noise. Their eyes closed, their rough breathing beating the rhythm of the air, the calm almost awkward movements following its unique song. There was no passion, but comforting silence. There was no love, but blissful companionship. There was no couple, but lonesome souls meeting, forming a single awkward but complete one.

When she came back home later that night, she felt different, she was beside herself, not from happiness as the old saying wants it, but just so away from what used to be her that she could not recognize the reflection in the mirror. The old self might have been talking in these terms about her scary hair, picking at odd places, soiled with dirt and leaves, about her dirty clothes and dripping wet shoes that stabbed that perfect _her_ that she had built. But as she looked at herself in the bathroom mirror she knew it was not it. The powder in her cheeks had slipped; the mask she had worked so hard to build had not slid back into its rightful place. It hanged loosely on her neck, balancing with any slight movement she made, threatening to fall at any moment, frailer and thinner than it had ever been. She picked it up and tried to make it fit back on her nose with some difficulty, pushing it against her face, tying it with back-up ties so that it stood in place at least for a while, so people could look at her and only see that picture and not what she had become.

She crossed her sister on the corridor that night, as she made her way back to her room, freshly showered and fixed, her mask hanging dangerously on her nose. Lily looked at her in the eye with her bright green ones, faced her with all their intensity a small smile curling her lips. Her eyes burned into her, seemed to read through her owns as in an open book, and then, her mask tilted and she had to catch it hastily before it threatened to break itself in pieces on the floor. Her sister's smile widened slightly wishing her a goodnight as it closed her room's door. She had thought she saw a shadow of knowing in her teeth, something that was threatening to fall off her mouth, something that had made her sister happy when she had caught her eyes. _Maybe_, she thought in her newly found clear face, _maybe we can still be sisters after all_. And she smiled.

The next day was a confused blur for her. She knew that she had woken up at some point in the morning, an unusual smile playing its way to her lips, widening them for most of the day. She remembered staying in her room, looking confused at the ceiling, as if strange images and forms were taking place on it, as if it's carefully painted colours were mixing and un-mixing and getting into strands, then circles, and squares, drawing faces forever-changing, swinging in some silent tune. She remembered being nicer to her sister that day, not daring to approach her too close, scared of what she knew, scared of what she was. What she was? She did not know. Awkward, for now was what she was. Like a newborn who does not know the body it's in yet, like an puberty-filled growing teenager than can barely stand on its feet. She found herself into something knew that she could not handle, for what she was not prepared, and her first reaction was to stay still. She tried as hard as she could to keep her mask from falling even though it tilted dangerously at the tip of her nose. She tried to keep her composure, to act as if nothing had happened, like that one time when they kissed, when they came back to that comfortable and silent stillness they had fallen in, and she was determined not to leave it.

That night, the last night of his summer holidays, he waited. He went there, to his usual spot against the streetlight because he wanted to meet her. For the first time, it was planned, it was predicted, foreseen, expected. He had not talked to or even seen her since the previous night, but he knew that she would come out. That she would come to meet him, whether under some false excuse like they usually did, whether honestly because she wanted to meet him. He stood still by the lamppost watching the sun set in the skyline, his eyes twitching towards that particular window he knew so well. He saw two shadows moving around it, talking, maybe even laughing. He could not distinguish them but he wished. He wished he had done something, after all, he wished.

She came out as the sun threw its last ray of light, like a last breath for the day and gave in to the night. He saw her thin form closing the front door, saw her tighten slightly her thin jumper around herself. He stared as she looked around, maybe looking for him, maybe checking whether anyone else was there, putting an act for the neighbours as she always did. Her darkened face finally fixed itself on his and moved her feet towards his lamp, dragging them on the floor, slowly, progressively like they were.

She finally reached him, her mask slid like water down her chin and hung by her neck. She reached up a hand, cupping his cheek in the darkness, awkwardly, slightly touching it, and he turned to face her, looking into her eyes. He knew then that she would never forget those eyes, no matter how hard she tried, she would not forget them. They showed all that he could not utter, all that he did not have the strength to say, to tell her. He saw her penetrating stare at him, her hand lingering by his cheek as he remained still. He saw her eyes searching in his, trying to understand what they were saying. He saw them widen in stubborn disbelief, he saw them water slightly in front of his. A stream passed between them, bringing all that that they could not say like it often did when they were alone, but for the one last time. The emptiness of his filled the change in hers like water fills a dried pool, and she lowered hers to the floor and withdrew her hand, breaking open a frozen waterfall cascading between their two bodies. And the traffic jam unlocked itself.

She broke past him, shoving his shoulder as she went. He knew she was now trying to suppress her tears, that she was searching desperately for her mask around her neck to keep them away from him, he knew that he would never see her again. She stopped then suddenly in her tracks, turning around sharply to face him, her face dry and her eyes only slightly bloodshot, a perfect composure for a perfect girl.

"_FREAK!"_ She shouted at him at the top of her lungs, all the hatred and disgust she had ever felt thrown into that world. He knew then that she had her mask on, strongly glued to her nose, lips and eyebrows, and that it would never come off again.

He supposed, as she turned the corner away from him that night, that she had bumped into that Dursley she would mention sometimes. He supposed she had finally given in to him, he supposed she had decided to keep her decision to go to the same College than him. He supposed it was that night when she figured she would be a housewife, that night that she decided she wanted to be a perfect mother, that night when she became what she was, what she is. He supposed and he knew that the mask she had worn all those years and had taken off only for him would never leave her face again, that that mask was her and she was it until they were buried together in her coffin for eternity.

"Muggle." He spat venomously under his breath, sliding his own mask back into place hanging it firmly on his rather long nose which it should never leave again, as he dragged his feet in the other direction, away from her, from her house, from what he should not be.

_A/N: eh. Still crazy. Hope you liked it, still one chapter to go!_

_Throughoutly inspired by CraigThompson's Blankets.Even though I just noticed it as I looked back at his drawings. They're awesome, by the way.__  
_

_Song "Swallowed in the Sea" by Coldplay _

_Please R&R! _


	3. Chapter 3: You Put Me On A Shelf

_Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. He would never accept it._

Chapter 3: You Put Me On A Shelf

_You put me on a shelf  
And kept me for yourself  
I can only blame myself  
You can only blame me_

He was not home for the next winter holydays, nor was he during the next summer. Instead, only Potter's gruesomely untidy dark hair showed up at their door, his selfish smirk shining at all sides, and it was there to stay. She had blindly looked around for him sometimes, searching uselessly for any movements under the streetlight's shadow through her sister's window.

She supposed then, as the summer neared to a close, that he had gone to that Lord he would sometimes speak of, that Dark Lord he worshipped and whose power he desired most of all. She remembered how he had sometimes fantasized on having such power in his hands, how he would use it with his wit and skill, how it would make him the most wanted man on earth. And so, she shrugged any thought of him off once again, she drew her mask back up her chin, nose and eyebrows and kept it there, steadied with tight ropes, mingling with her skin, blood and organs, making it all one and one only for the longest it could.

That summer passed, fast and discrete, and in September she accepted Vernon's marriage proposal. By spring there were wed and moving to another neighbourhood, closer to London, where they were to build on their lives, were she was to plant her mask as a tree and live the life it had brought her. About a year later they had a son, and shortly she received a letter from her sister notifying her of her nephew's birth. She had not talked to her since that last summer, barely noticing her presence at Christmas or her own wedding, leaving her forever when she moved out from home. She had then ignored that letter, ignored the boy's name, ignored his father's and moved on with her life.

It passed as a blur before her eyes, that life she worked so hard for. Like a masked ball it shifted and swung in front of them; dancing through songs and acts, switching and moving. She had taken care of her son as she promised she would, she had cared for her husband like she had vowed to. She had kept all her mind and spirit on her tasks, on her cleaning and caring, on her reputation keeping, her nose high in front of others. She had kept her too strong curiosity at bay, trying desperately to feed it with mere random and meaningless information about star's and neighbour's lives, about the people they talked and walked with, about the things they did and said to do. Sometimes, she would see beyond it all, sometimes she would distinguish their masks and acts, their own falsity matching her own. And then, she would tilt her nose even higher as if she were trying to keep her thin cover from falling off of it. But it never had, it never had fallen off again as it had with him, it had stayed on its rightful place, clawing to her face, decided never to let go.

She had kept her distance from all that she craved for. From that magic she wanted and spit on. She thought, she convinced herself, that it was that magic, or pure sorcery, that had pulled the act forcefully off her face, that had in a way hypnotized her into believing she had once cared, into believing _he_ had once cared; into believing she had been someone different, into believing she could be someone different. She could hear of it sometimes, hear her nephew talking about it, worshipping it. She had taken the bait, at first, feeding herself from it, almost unconsciously taking part in his enthusiasm. Later, as he had let out of that Dark Lord again, as he had mentioned his name – she could never remember – his oh-so-terrible name that had murdered his parents, she had even worried for a awhile, the thought of those winter night creeping up her mind, the thought of him and his dreams, and she had wondered whether he shared that Lord's power, whether that Lord was he. And suddenly her face seemed to melt through her features, her curiosity seemed to rise like a monster from its deep sleep, and she would stop the boy, act scandalized, shout at him, and it all hardened off again and stayed like a crust in from of her irises.

But then, here he is, sitting on her couch. That boy she so badly treated, who had no fault in all that she built, in all that she lived through, and who paid for it. He is here now, in front of her, his face drawn to hers, his eyes either searching her own pale ones, either looking down at his worn shoes, his back bent, his elbows on his knees. His hands are twitching; his fingers are mingled, pausing seldom to run through his untidy raven hair, to clean his glasses nervously, to play with his own ear. His mouth is moving hesitantly, his lips are dry and nervous, as he retells her all that happened and that she ignored, all she truth she repulses, all of that world she craves to know and which she had spit out of her own.

She was startled in her cleaning by the doorbell earlier this afternoon by the end of the summer, and she moved suspiciously to open the door. He was standing there, a young and nervous man, his bright green eyes terribly aged by things he should never have known, things he should never had seen. He looked searchingly at her; he tried to act strong and imposing as any young man. He asked then whether her husband and Dudley were home, she shook her head slightly muttering something about a work interview and a coffee in London, still startled by his visit. He nodded knowingly letting a small drop of relief run through his face. But nervousness returned to his lips, as he tried to utter difficultly that he wanted to talk to her, if he could come in the house he had once lived, to talk to her only, to tell her. She nodded mutely back at him, stepping slightly away from the door to let him through.

He glanced over his shoulder at three persons standing in the street, and gave them a reassuring nod before entering the house. A couple of them moved away then, a tall red-haired young man with his young bushy-haired girlfriend, his arm firmly on her shoulders, dragging her gently away to a nearby bench as she threw some last worried looks at Harry. But the third stayed, a young woman, her hair like fire around her face, staring determinately at the house, her arms crossed and her face settled. For a moment, Petunia wished she would come in too, she wished she would stay, wishing she could apologize, wishing she could make it all up again, wishing she were back to her. But when the girl moved reluctantly towards the boy's calling, she was glad she did, too scared of her reaction if she hadn't, too scared of the image of Lily.

On her couch, he stammers, playing with the tea she just brought him, an act which seemed to surprise him into jolting from his seat. Now, he opens and closes his mouth in front of her, like a fish gapping for water in a dry desert, toppling with each uttered word.

"Well, I – er – came here because – hem. There are just some things, you know, that I was told – that I saw – during this last year. And I thought – I mean, I just had a feeling – that maybe you ought to know about it, I mean, somehow - ..." He sighs tiredly, a clear struggle stretched upon his face. He runs his fingers through his unravelled hair, rubs his tired eyes and looks up at her again, and starts over. He sums up here and now to her all that he lived, all that he witnessed during this last year, all that she knew not and all its 'why's and 'how's, all it's 'what's and 'when's. For a moment, he pauses, his mouth gaping at her lack of reaction. He thought she would have jerked up at his first word, she would have pushed him out of her house, she would have yelled at him at the very least. But here she sits on that tight couch, her pale eyes looking down on her pale face, avoiding his by all costs; here she sits in front of him, silent and attentive, drinking each of his words. He closes his mouth again, realising his ridiculous figure, gulps the bulge forming in his throat and continues with his story.

She thinks, she evades him for a few minutes, she looks at him absent-mindedly, she studies him, sees what he has become. A fine young man, she has to admit, his eyes so much like his mother's. She can't face him, she thinks, after all his been through, after all he is telling her, after all she herself put him through. Her life passes like a blur in front of her eyes, it runs and jumps and fumes with no pause, tilting and sweeping on a silent and bored tune. Until a name, a single lone name escapes his mouth, a name she knew and forgot, a name she loved and hated.

"Listen – I know, I know you knew him." He blurters out loudly as if trying to restrain her from moving, from denying it, from throwing him out. But she moves no more, she stares. Her eyes are wide and distant, every suppressed thought rising like raging volcanoes in her inner, rising and erupting in images and sounds, in scents and touches, evolving her in its commotion, taking over her whole trembling body.

But it slips, she knows, it slips again, like it had more than twenty years before, it slips and tilts at the tip of her nose.

Her nephew stares for a second, confused and ashamed. He continues with his story, he tells her all that _he_ did not on those few white-lit nights, all that she guessed, all that she hoped secretly under her pillow, all that she thought of him. He tells her what he did, he tells her how he was, he tells the 'why's and 'how's, he tells her all and nothing.

She thinks, for a moment, that he might know. He might, by some strange turn of feat, know who he really was during those nights; know who she really was during those nights. But if he does, he does not show it. He keeps it at bay, letting only slip what she had guessed, letting only slip what that dark boy had felt for Lily, what he had endured for her. He understands that she had known him, he understands that she had seen him, at least because of her sister, he understands she knew some good of him, he ignores how much, he knows not how much she has ever missed him. He takes a deep breath again, cutting short his sentence, cutting short how that skinny and greasy boy had helped him, how he had contributed to the destruction of that Dark Lord he talked so much about, how he had been a secret hero. He runs a hand through his hair again, he rubs his eyes again, as if a heavy weight was heaving on his thin shoulders, and he breathes out.

"– He – he was killed. And he saved our lives."

It topples and crashes, and she cannot stop it. It topples off her face, off her eyebrows, nose and chin. It topples to the ground with no final stand. It topples, it crashes, it breaks. Into million pieces it's splattered across her clean wooden floor, endlessly it stood there, never to come whole again.

A terrible shiver runs through her whole body, shaking it violently and endlessly on her couch, washing over her like a cold avalanche. Her trembling hand jolts to her face, tries desperately to hide it, to keep it from view, to keep it away. She feels naked – naked as she never has been – she feels alone and naked. She feels whole for an imperceptible second, and then falls into nothingness, into darkness and reality, away from all that masquerade, falls into him.

She barely registers her nephew jerking up from his awkward seat, she does not see him running at her, stopping in his tracks, staring utterly confused at her face. She does not see he bend down trying to reprieve the fallen tea cup, trying with a wave of a wooden stick to put it back together, imagining for a wild second that it was the cause of her sorrow. But it will stay no more. He leaves it at once, startled again by a violent shaken sob of hers, and walks awkwardly to her pitiable figure. He kneels at her feet, rubbing her arm nervously, staring confused at her face, muttering comforting words in his utter misunderstanding, in his utter amazement.

He uncovered her and she knows it. She knows that that hard mask she wore for all those long years, for all her life, that hardened mask made of steel had imploded into nothingness, melted before her nephew's lost eyes, undone forever in the vast light atmosphere of the Earth, brought to pieces by him. That lonesome boy she had once met, that skinny and lost boy she had once talked to, with whom she spent so much long and blissful nights, hiding from the sun, covered by the moon's soft blanket. He had unlocked it, he had unlocked the fantasy she hid behind, he had unlocked it at once, after all those years, he had unlocked it and kept the key so she could lock it no more, wear it no more. He took it to the depths of the Earth, to the highest cloud, taking it with him until she would come and then, she would see, she would see she needed it no more, she would see the ghost of her mask hovering in the planet's crust, and she would step on it, crash it again against the hard ground, and would hear of it no more.

But she would not see him, she would not see him ever again, she thinks as she stares at her house's tea-stained floor. Her tired eyes tilt up at her nephew's, stare into their green depth, and she hugs him, for the first time in 18 years she takes him in her arms, letting the last sawdust slip away with her tears. He is surprised beyond belief and she knows it, he is stunned into place, kneeling there on the floor as she holds him tight against her. His mouth is gasping for air, his eyes wide and unmoving. Until, after some long moments, she feels his muscles relax under her touch, she feels his body lean closer to hers; she feels his now strong arms lace themselves awkwardly around her, brushing her back nervously.

"You know...I..." he stammers in her ear lost in his words, in his thoughts, in his discovery. She can still feel his amazement; can almost hear the wheels working in his skull, his thoughts racing trying desperately to find a reason for her acts, for her sudden act of gentleness. Maybe, she thinks, he still hasn't got it. He might think this was only due to her sister, to the sudden recall of her sister he brought to her, to the sudden vision of her, to the sudden remorse she might feel. But, whatever crosses his head at this moment, she cannot tell, and she bets, to her own inner self, that neither can he.

"I'm holding a funeral for him – and – er – well – hehem – you might... you can come if you want. Maybe, er, you could meet Ginny, I guess - ... – I guess I'd like you to meet her."

And she feels it, she senses it her voice. He knows, she thinks. He knows it fell and broke, he knows he found her; he knows she changed to what she was always supposed to be. Later, she would have to talk to Vernon, to Dudley. Later, she would have to meet Harry's friends, later she would have to apologize to them. Later, she would have to fix it all, later she would have to be honest with all of them. But now, her head burrowed on the shoulder of her nephew, of Lily's son, she thinks of nothing else. _Maybe_, she thinks,_we can still be sisters after all_.

_Not swallowed in the sea._

**A/N:** _So, there it goes, I'm done. I still think I am sort of insane, don't you? Anyhow – it ended with a happy ending, after all, I had not planned to... But please, REVIEW! I beg you._

_Oh, and there's this weird thing I mentioned on the previous chapters, about a "traffic jam unlocking itself" Actually, originally, it was to be a metaphor and I was going to explain it on his chapter...but it did not fit, so... Basically, I just wanted to say that Petunia and Snape's meeting was only like two cars crossing each other on a red light. _

"_And the car seems to halt at her side again and lowers its window softly, making her lower her own by the same act. Because it was all it had been, or so she had convinced herself, nothing but a crossing car with lowering windows. All that winter, all that summer, was nothing more than a red light, nothing more than two cars halting one beside the other, when eyes meet and cross, avoided and reunited, and for a second, that person from across the door is the only important thing in the world. But then, the light turns green, and the cars move, each to its way, one right, one left, one straight forward, the traffic unlocks itself, and the other is forgotten, buried under lights and sounds."_

_Well, there it is. Thank you all for reading..._

_PLEASE REVIEW!!!_


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